By Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES, Feb 23 (Reuters) - Nick Reiner, the troubled younger son of slain Hollywood filmmaker Rob Reiner, was due back in court on Monday, after two postponements and a change from one defense team to another, for arraignment on murder charges stemming from the fatal stabbing of his parents.
He is expected to plead not guilty to two counts of first-degree murder in the fatal knife attack on actor-director Rob Reiner, 78, and photographer-producer Michele Reiner, 70, whose bodies were found on December 14 inside their West Los Angeles mansion.
Nick Reiner, 32, who has acknowledged a years-long struggle with substance abuse, has remained jailed without bond since his arrest in the hours after his parents were slain in one of the most shocking celebrity homicide cases in Los Angeles history.
The killings stirred an outpouring of dismay from Hollywood luminaries who had worked with Rob Reiner for decades as an actor, director and screenwriter, first gaining fame by co-starring in the 1970s hit television comedy “All in the Family.”
Reiner went on to become a prominent Democratic Party activist and donor. He and his wife, married for nearly 37 years, had planned to attend an evening gathering with former President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama on the day of the murders.
Nick Reiner was widely reported to have quarreled with his parents while the three were attending a holiday party hosted by comedian Conan O’Brien the night before the couple were slain.
If convicted as charged, Nick Reiner would face life in prison without the possibility of parole. Prosecutors have yet to decide whether they would seek a death sentence.
Authorities have disclosed few details about the circumstances of the crime and offered no explanation for what may have precipitated the killings. Autopsies found both victims died of “multiple sharp force injuries.”
High-profile defense lawyer Alan Jackson, initially retained to represent Nick Reiner, abruptly withdrew from the case without explanation on January 7, resulting in the arraignment being postponed for a second time in three weeks. Jackson was replaced by lawyers from the public defender’s office.
Neither of Nick Reiner’s siblings - older brother Jake Reiner, 34, and younger sister Romy, 28, who reportedly was the first to find her father’s body - was present in court for their brother’s first two hearings.
Following his initial court appearance in December, the siblings issued a joint statement expressing the “unimaginable pain” they were experiencing following the “horrific and devastating loss of our parents.”
It remained to be seen how Nick Reiner’s history of drug addiction, rehab and periodic homelessness - struggles that inspired the movie “Being Charlie,” which he co-wrote with his father, might factor into the murder case.
The New York Times reported last week that he was placed in 2020 under a court-approved mental health conservatorship that had allowed for involuntary psychiatric treatment, but that the legal arrangement ended in 2021.
The Times said that both the public defender’s office and the district attorney’s office declined to comment on the matter.
(Reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by David Gregorio)
